Eighty-five percent of U.S. 15-year-old students who took the most recent PISA examination say that they expect to have a highly-skilled occupation when they join the workforce,” reports Jennifer Craw for the National Center on Education and the Economy.
However, their expectations aren’t matched by their achievement. Only 17 percent scored at the top two proficiency levels in any subject on the international exam; one third didn’t reach the basic proficiency level in math, science and reading.
The U.S. isn’t the only country with overconfident adolescents, warns OECD’s new report, Dream jobs: Teenagers’ career aspirations and the future of work.
However, high achievers from disadvantaged backgrounds hold much less ambitious aspirations than high scorers from privileged families.